I don't know "how" it works, I just applied for him and since he had no income or pension after his last paycheck in Dec he was on it in a month, cuz Thank God he was in January on the 14th he ended up in the hospital and on the 23rd of January he was in intensive care for 2 weeks than the nursing home in late Feb or early March can't remember exactly right now but all was paid for by Medicaid and he still is on it as well as Medicare now too. Our caseworker gets his info update when they need it and he gets put on it again. He only gets a whole 16 bux for food but he don't eat much anyway and that's because of the SSD check he gets monthly. He has no worthy possesions at all. All he owns is an old Cadi 95, that he actually signed over to me IF something happened to him during surgery, which didn't happen so now who knows what he's gonna do. Can't get the damn thing to pass an "E" Check here in OH we have to do, runs great though! Big ol 2 door El Dorado, he actually gave it to my youngest when she turned 16 and signed it over to me, than after she got another car,his cousin passed and we got her Neon I think 98 so I signed it back to him lol and we still have that Neon but she has another car her father gave her his 2003 Toyota Camry ya she's the baby can you tell? lol So you have to have NOTHING to get it more or less. Good luck!